


Can't Take The Sky

by Iverna



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, Gen, Sci-Fi AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-25
Updated: 2017-02-24
Packaged: 2018-09-26 18:07:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9914711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iverna/pseuds/Iverna
Summary: She knows how to find people. He’s got a fast ship. They need each other - and neither of them is happy about it.… in which Emma Swan and Killian Jones team up to apprehend an armed and dangerous military deserter, who just so happens to be Killian’s brother. Shenanigans ensure - in space. Sci-fi AU inspired by all the things I love





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day 4 of seastarved's Fantasy Pretzel Week over on Tumblr. There's a graphic to go with it which you can see here: http://winterbythesea.tumblr.com/post/157668382882/cant-take-the-sky-13

 Blaster fire lit up the alleyway around Emma, flashing as it hit the grimy walls, the high-pitched whirr of the guns drowning out noise of the speeders from the street beyond. She flung herself into the meagre cover of a waste disposal unit, breathing hard. Her back was still hitting the wall when her companion joined her, whirling around to fire at their attackers as he backed into her.

And kept backing up.

“Hook,” she pressed out as his shoulders obscured her view, the scent of leather and soap almost overpowering the smell of the alley. “You’re crushing me.”

“My apologies, but I’ve no desire to get shot,” he gritted out. “Where did all these fellows come from?”

“You’re the one who poked the gundark den,” she reminded him sharply. “Why’d you break cover? You were supposed to wait for my signal.”

She’d known going in that this mission was a huge risk. It had gone well at first; they’d landed on Dathmun without any of the trouble that Killian had predicted, and he’d even managed to talk the dock officials out of the usual trumped-up customs charges. Up until give minutes ago, Emma would have said that the place was perfect—easy in, just busy enough to provide cover and distractions, and no weapons bans.

She might still be saying it now, if her words weren’t going to be drowned out by the blaster fire.

 “Did you see how he was looking at you?” Killian demanded, edging carefully forward to snap off two quick shots at their attackers.

“How—“ Emma felt her eyes widen, something fast and hot and angry rising inside her. “You got _jealous_?”

“No,” he shot back, a little too quickly. “You were about to be made.”

She glared at the back of his head. She’d known the score. Walsh was neither trustworthy nor trusting, and she got a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach every time he looked at her. But she was used to handling sleazy guys and criminals. They’d talked, she’d smiled and flirted just enough to keep him off-balance, he’d smiled indulgently back at her and taken her hand in his...

And then her supposed back-up had decided to interfere, and it had all gone straight to hell.

Damn the pirate and his ego.

“Yeah right,” she told him, even while her mind ran through their options. It was a depressingly short list. “What were you thinking? You know that was our best shot at—”

“Oh, was it?” he challenged. “Because from where I was sitting, all you seemed to be getting was an absolutely atrocious display of something he probably considers “charm”.”

“So you decided to play hero and rescue me from bad flirting?” she snarled. “Thanks a lot.”

Killian’s tone was all stubbornness. “He was up to something.”

She wished she could shove him. But if she did that, he’d get shot, and she’d have to carry him or drag him, which would probably result in _her_ getting shot, and really, it wasn’t worth losing her temper. “Damn it, Hook, I hired you to do the flying, not the thinking.”

“You didn’t hire me, we agreed to work together,” Killian corrected, the last syllable almost cut off as he flinched back and into her.

“Never again,” Emma swore.

“I’m constantly delighted by your company too, Swan,” Killian ground out. “I do so enjoy the nagging and the insults.”

“Yeah, well, I get grouchy when I’m being shot at. Character flaw. Maybe if you didn’t break cover for no reason other than—”

“Could we possibly discuss this later?” The words sounded like they were coming from between clenched teeth. “I’m a mite busy here.”

As if to prove his words, blaster fire flashed by overhead, scorching the wall above Emma’s head.

“Are you actually hitting anything or are you guys just trying to impress each other?”

“Always so supportive, love.” He fired again.

He was a good shot, but even the great Killian Jones wasn’t going to be able to shoot his way out of this one. He seemed determined to try, though, and Emma knew that she couldn’t count on him to come up with a better plan. She gritted her teeth. He was more reckless than a whole battalion of Resistance fighters. And the way those guys were trying to get themselves killed, that was saying a lot.

She looked around for inspiration. They couldn’t stay here; any moment now, Walsh’s guys were going to start advancing on them, and that was going to get very painful very fast.

She glanced up. The buildings here were old, all made of the same drab, slightly reddish grey concrete. The windows were some kind of equally cheap flexplast, and she had her MagnAscent gun, but getting up the wall without getting shot would be a problem. Behind them, further along the alley, she could see very little in the way of cover, and a lot of open ground between.

But across the alley near Walsh’s crew, just within her line of vision, she could see a small, metallic box half-embedded in the wall. A common sight in the more run-down areas, it held receivers and most of the electronic conduits going into the building, all the technological advances that had been made after the ancient structure had been constructed.

It was impervious to energy blasts. But Killian Jones was an eccentric man, and one of his eccentricities was an old-fashioned pistol that fired bullets, not lasers.

Emma reached for it, snaking her hand around and up his torso, and under his black leather jacket. She cursed herself for it even while she did it; their bodies were pressed too close as it was, and it felt far too intimate. She could feel the heat of his body under her hand, the way his chest was heaving with laboured breaths, his heart pounding with the adrenaline.

_From the fight_ , she reminded herself. _Which we’re in. With people who want us dead._

“What the—“ Killian broke off. “Swan, I’m flattered, but I must tell you, your timing is atrocious—“

“Shut up,” Emma snapped, pulling the gun from the holster under his arm. “Hold still.”

For once, he did what he was told, and Emma lined up the shot over his shoulder. The gun felt too heavy in her hand, but she’d used it before, and while it wasn’t as accurate as a blaster, her target wasn’t that small.

Holding her breath, she fired.

The wall across the street exploded. Someone yelled. The blasters fell silent.

Emma tucked the pistol into her belt, took out the MagnAscent, and fired it up above one of the windows. Then she tugged at Killian’s shoulder. “Hold onto me.”

He grinned. “As you wish.”

Rolling her eyes, she nevertheless gripped him back with her free hand as he wrapped his arms around her. Normally, she’d have made him handle the gun, but while he was stronger, he only had one fully functional hand.

Besides which, at least this way, she didn’t have to suffer the indignity of clinging to him.

She didn’t stop to check if Walsh’s guys were watching. If this didn’t work, they’d be dead either way.

With Killian wrapped around her like a Bardenian monkey lizard, she pulled the trigger to activate the reel. The ground fell away—more slowly than usual, the motor in the gun straining to move their combined weights. Air rushed past her, whipping her hair into her face. She shook her head and looked up, tracking time and distance—

She pushed off the wall just beneath the window. It wasn’t her best effort, since Killian’s added weight made any kind of jump difficult, and when they went swinging back towards the window, it only gave a dull sort of “thunk”.

Killian’s breath left him in a sharp huff as his shoulders hit the window. Emma winced. She was going to have to shoot the pane, and that meant relinquishing her hold on Killian. She hoped he had a good grip. “Push off again. And hold on. I’m gonna have to—“

But even as she spoke, the window slid sideways into the wall, revealing a wide-eyed young woman with dark eyes and hair. “Who are _you_?”

“Stand back,” Emma ordered, and she managed to push off again, just enough to swing Killian through the opening. He made it, clutching gracelessly at the window frame and levering himself into the room beyond, a small bedroom from the looks of it. The dark-haired woman stumbled back as Killian climbed in.

Someone yelled below, and a blaster shot charred the wall.

“Swan!” Killian lunged back around to grab her, his hook snagging her under one arm while his hand gripped her arm. He pulled her through the window with no ceremony or consideration. Her knee knocked against concrete, sending a burst of pain along her leg. She heard something rip. Killian cursed.

Then she was inside, stumbling from the windowsill and into Killian. They went down, Emma landing more or less on top of Killian, who groaned.

“Sorry,” she gasped.

He looked up at her, his blue eyes full of concern as they met hers. “All right?”

“Fine.” Another shot rang outside. Sirens began blaring in the distance, growing louder. “Yeah. Just great.”

“What are you doing?” a voice interrupted, and Emma looked up at the woman whose apartment they had just fallen into. She looked to be in her early twenties, dressed in clothes that Emma recognised as on the conservative side of local fashion. She also looked scared.

“We’re not gonna hurt you,” she said, as gently as she could. “We just got into trouble back there, and—“

“I know,” the young woman said, her chin lifted with a confidence that Emma was sure she didn’t feel. “I saw. Are you thieves? Or with the Resistance?”

Emma resisted the urge to roll her eyes at the spark of idealism in the girl’s eyes at the second suggestion, and looked back down at Killian, who merely raised an eyebrow. “Uhm, no,” Emma said. “We’re, uh, looking for a friend.”

“My brother,” Killian added helpfully, twisting his head so he could look at the woman.

Then he looked back up at Emma, and his mouth twisted into that familiar lop-sided smile that always set her teeth on edge. “By the by, do you want to get off me, or were you just getting comfortable?”

Her cheeks grew warm. She glared at him. The problem with that was that it required meeting his eyes, which were very blue, and full of mischief, and far too pretty to belong to a man like him. “Nothing comfortable about it,” she told him acidly, rolling on one knee and ignoring the pain there.

“Please don’t get me wrong, it’s far from the worst position I’ve been in,” Killian told her, still grinning. “But alas, time and place—“

“Shut _up_ ,” Emma growled, getting to her feet. Her knee complained, and her arm was going to kill her tomorrow, like it always did after a stunt like that, but for now, she was good. “We need to move, before they figure out where we went.”

“Aye.” Killian took a little longer to get up, and she caught the brief wince as he rolled his shoulders.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Perfectly fine,” he assured her, gesturing to the door. “Ladies first.”

She hated it when he did that. She wasn’t sure what it was about those gentlemanly moments he got, but they annoyed her almost more than the damn smirk did. And he knew it, too, which was probably why he did it constantly.

She shoved him towards the door. “Age before beauty.”

He laughed. “You know how to flatter a man, love.”

“My one and only goal,” Emma said drily. “ _Move_.”

“Aye, aye.” He swaggered out the door, pausing only to give a dramatic bow to the dark-haired woman, who seemed to be a little unsure of what to make of them. “Thank you for the assistance, milady.”

She blushed. “You’re welcome.”

Emma rolled her eyes. When she passed the young woman, she hesitated, and said, “Look, we appreciate the help, but in future, maybe don’t let strangers into the house like that.”

The girl gave her a look that questioned her intelligence. “What, I should let them shoot the window out instead? That _is_ what you were gonna do, right?”

She had a point. “Fair enough.” Emma shook off her misgivings—she’d learned long ago that she couldn’t worry about everyone in the galaxy. You had to learn to handle yourself, sooner or later.

She followed Killian through the tiny apartment and out into the stairwell. He turned to look at her. “Up or down?”

She hesitated. She didn’t know the layout of this part of town, but they’d run a long way down that alley...

“Down,” she decided. “We should have enough time before they can go around, and the cops are on their way, that should stall them.”

They took the stairs, half-running and half-leaping down the four flights. Emma shrugged out of her jacket as she went, tossing it aside.

Killian stared. “Won’t you be wanting that?”

“It just had a fatal encounter with a hook.”

He winced. “Sorry. I’ll buy you a new one once we get out of here.”

“You mean _if_ ,” she grumbled. She didn’t need him to buy her a new jacket.

He shrugged easily as he reached for the door controls. “I have every faith in us.”

The street outside the apartment building was a lot livelier than the alley had been. Brightly-coloured signs flared above restaurants and tiny take-out booths, several big netscreens advertised candy bars and the new FlareTech speeder bike and one of the more extravagant net dramas. The air smelled of greasy food and fuel.

Emma’s gaze was drawn to her left, where the red and green lights of the cop speeders flashed. The cavalry had arrived—too late to be of any use, but then again, it wouldn’t have done them much good either way. Both she and Killian would probably be arrested on sight.

“This way.” She grabbed Killian’s hook as he joined her in the street, dragging him right, away from the commotion.

Speeders and hover cars flew past overhead. There were no crowds, only a handful of other pedestrians, and most of them were keeping a safe but curious distance from the cops.

“We need a ride,” Emma said, looking around. “Can you--?”

“On it.” Killian pulled away from her made straight for a speeder bike that was parked nearby. By the time Emma caught up with him, he already had it going, his hook making quick work of the wiring. To a casual observer, it would have looked like he’d used a key.

He did have his moments.

Then again...

“Did you have to pick a _bike_?” she groused, eyeing the contraption warily. She’d never been overly fond of flying, especially with nothing between her and the rest of the world except for a solid grip and a prayer.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware we had time to shop around,” Killian shot back. “Next time, by all means, let me know.”

He had a point. “Fine.” Emma took a deep breath and swung her leg over the saddle behind him, her hands on his shoulders.

“Hold tight,” Killian said, and she could hear the grin in his voice.

She wrapped her arms around his middle, and tightened them involuntarily as he gunned the engine and the ground dropped away.

“Easy on the goods, love,” he called back.

She cursed at him as he accelerated even more.

Speeder bikes were bad. Speeder bikes piloted by Killian Jones, Emma found out very quickly, were worse. He flew like he seemed to do everything, with reckless abandon and no regard for the rules. She gritted her teeth and hung on, doing her best to ignore his scent in her nose, his hair tickling at her forehead, and the way his stomach muscles shifted and flexed subtly as he flew.

Of all the people in the galaxy, she told herself for the hundredth time since this had begun. Of all the billions of people out there, she had to work with _him_.

_Why?_

Because she needed a ship, she reminded herself. She needed a ship, and she couldn’t afford to hire one until she’d fulfilled this contract. She could count herself lucky, really, that she’d managed to get one at all. Even if it was being captained by the most reckless, irritating, insufferable man in the business.

For a wonder, they didn’t run into any more trouble until they got to the spaceport, although Killian probably wouldn’t be able to come back here without facing a few traffic violation charges. They abandoned the speeder bike a block away from the spaceport and walked the rest of the way in silence, alert for any sign of pursuit.

It didn’t come.

Emma had never been so glad to see the _Jolly Roger_. The _Brig_ -class freighter was an old model, but it had been modified so much that it barely qualified under its original designation anymore. It certainly wasn’t the defenceless, sluggish merchant vessel that it had begun its life as.

She strode up the ramp into the main hold, leaving Killian to deal with the dock officials and get their clearance to leave. Tossing the MagnAscent onto a table, she braced herself on it, and took a deep breath.

That had been too close.

 

*  *  *

 

Killian braced himself as he made his way across the docking bay towards his ship and started up the ramp.

If he knew Emma Swan at all, he was in for it.

True enough, when he came up the ramp, she was just straightening up into combat mode, arms crossed and mouth set and eyes flashing. The silvery light of the glow panels caught in her blond hair and cast her toned arms into sharp relief.

“So,” she said, her voice that careful calm that always heralded trouble. “Want to tell me what happened back there?”

He really didn’t. At least, not all of it. Not the part where he’d lost hold of his temper and wanted to slug the tech trader in his stupid, smug face.

In fact, he wanted nothing more than to forget that part entirely. He didn’t get jealous. Jealousy was a mean, insecure, pointless emotion. Even if he had any right to get jealous over another man flirting with Swan, and he had no such right, he still wouldn’t want to.

He should never have agreed to this mission. He should have told Emma to get out, and gone after Liam by himself. The trouble was, he knew he wouldn’t have gotten even this far without her. She was the expert at finding people. He needed her.

But bloody hell, it was hard to work with a woman who was always at her most beautiful when she was angry.

“Like I said,” he told her now. “He was onto you.”

That wasn’t a lie. Years spent among the galaxy’s worst had honed his sense for treachery, and he knew the bastard had been up to something.

“No, he was suspicious,” Emma corrected him, cold fire in her green eyes. “He suspected that I wanted something. There’s a difference. And I was _getting_ what I wanted.”

His temper flashed at that. He wrestled it back down, along with an acerbic remark about what Emma _wanted_ from Walsh.

_Get it together, Jones. If you want to slut-shame, you can start with yourself._

“Ah, so you found Liam?” he demanded, his anger—at himself, at Walsh, at this whole situation—making his words come out sharp and clipped.

“Of course not,” she snapped. “He didn’t know anything.”

Killian had all but gathered that, but he wanted to scream. Three weeks. They’d been chasing after Liam for three weeks. He’d been cooped up on his ship with Emma Swan for three weeks. And it was driving him insane.

She argued with him about everything. She left her weapons lying around. She ate her meals everywhere _except_ at the table in the lounge. She did pull-ups in the main hold in nothing but shorts and a tank top. His refresher unit smelled of her shampoo.

Three weeks was far too long.

Or far too short, but _that_ was a dangerous sort of thought that he needed to abandon immediately.

He shoved it away and gave her a challenging look. “Right. So what’s the problem?”

“The _problem_ is that I didn’t want to shoot my way out of there!”

“You’re the one who led us into the alley,” Killian reminded her sharply. “I wanted to leave by the front door.”

“You _always_ want to march through the front door,” she snapped. “Why bother with subtlety or patience when you’re the famous Captain Hook, right? Just waltz right in the front door and start shooting.”

He bristled. She was making him sound like some kind of macho berserker. He could be subtle. He could out-subtle her any day, if he wanted to.

He sauntered towards her, a roll in his gait and a slight smirk onto his lips, the one he knew she hated. “As I recall, that was _your_ tactic on Arvella, love. Only you didn’t waltz so much as steamblast, really.”

She looked livid, colour rising in her cheeks. “That was different. I didn’t have time to play it cute. And in case you forgot, I saved your life with my _steamblasting_ , I didn’t get you shot at!”

“I covered you back there, didn’t I?” he countered. “Even when you dragged us into a dead-end alley and almost got us cornered.”

Her eyes blazed. “I also got us un-cornered!”

“Yes, yes, it was very impressive,” he snapped. They were standing close enough now that he could have reached out and touched her—not that he was about to do that. He’d lost one hand. He had no desire to lose another. “Look, Swan, we got what we came for, and we got away in one piece. Can’t we just call it a win? I’ll cede any and all credit to you.”

“I don’t want credit, I want a partner I can rely on!”

That slammed into him like a punch to the gut.

_For this mission_ , he reminded himself. _She’s talking about this mission._

“If I _have_ to be saddled with one, I mean,” Emma went on, sounding disgusted, but she wasn’t looking at him anymore. He knew that look. It was the one she got when she didn’t want him getting the wrong idea.

And _that_ only happened when there was an idea to get.

And she looked like she was about to bolt.

“You’re more than welcome to saddle me, love.” It was a terrible line. Probably the worst he’d ever said. Emma’s face was full of incredulous derision as her eyes swept back up to meet his, but that was all right. It was better than that frightened look she got sometimes. It was safe. His ego could take the hit.

“Seriously?” she asked, in that familiar wry ways of hers.

He ducked his head, looking up at her as he scratched at his neck. “I know. But the only other option was something to do with riding and that seemed rather too crass.”

She shook her head, but he saw the smile tugging at her mouth. “Oh, now you’re prudish?”

He grinned. “I do have standards.”

She laughed at that, and he knew he should probably be offended, but it felt too much like a truce. He glanced at the gun on the table behind her, and gestured. “Is everything in order?”

“What?” She glanced down at it. “No. Froze up. Gonna have to replace it, or repair it if I can. It’s not meant for two people.”

“Sorry. I’ll cover it.”

“It’s fine,” she assured him, predictably. She wasn’t going to let him buy her a new jacket, either, despite the fact that she’d insist on it all being his fault.

He sighed. “As you wish. What now, then?”

“Now...” Emma shook her head, taking out her portscreen and frowning at it. “I want to check a few things. I’m pretty sure Walsh is working for Zelena, so Belle’s info might not be totally wrong. You don’t need me for take-off, do you?”

“I’m quite accustomed to flying solo,” he assured her.

She arched an eyebrow and looked at him, lips stretching into a smirk, and he realised what he’d said. Or rather, how it could be taken. And for once, Emma had gotten to the innuendo first. Warmth crept up his neck, and he knew from experience that the ship’s bright interior lights would show off the blush to perfection.

Damn it.

Emma said nothing, just grinned, looking delighted at having turned the tables on him for once.

He fought to get back on-balance, trying to ignore the heat that had now reached his cheeks, and managed a smirk of his own as he added. “But don’t let that deter you from giving me a hand.”

Emma just laughed at him, and sauntered off towards her bunk. Killian watched her go, her hips swaying and her stride sure, blonde hair streaming behind her.

He ran a hand through his hair and blew out a breath. He’d known that this mission would be hell on his ego, because Emma was always hell on his ego, but blushing like a little girl? That was a new low.

Cursing, he dragged himself up the ladder and headed for the cockpit. He ran through the preflight checks and brought the engines online with automatic movements, his mind lightyears away. He called port control for clearance, lightening the formal conversation with a few irreverent, flirtatious remarks that put a smile into the controller’s voice, and cursed again when he realised how easy it was with anyone except Emma Swan. She was immune to him. And he was anything but immune to her, apparently, even after three weeks of near-constant exposure. If anything, he was getting worse.

She joined him after they left Dathmun’s atmosphere, the starry expanse of space stretching out ahead of them. Killian always loved that moment, when the clouds and haze of atmosphere fell away and it was just him and the ship and the stars. It felt like being able to breathe again.

Less so when Emma was around, of course, because she had a way of sucking the air from his lungs.

“Well, I’ve got an idea,” she announced, brushing past him to settle into the copilot’s chair. “But I hate it.”

Killian cast a glance at the shields display to make sure they were holding, and turned to her with one eyebrow raised. “The suspense is killing me, love.”

“I just checked,” Emma began. She had that furrow between her brows, the one she always got when she didn’t like something. As the personification of several things that Emma Swan did not like, he was intimately familiar with it. “After what Walsh said, I just had a feeling, and...”

 She waved a hand irritably, reluctant as always to admit to playing a hunch. Killian, who owed his life, one stint in jail, and many hours of frustration to Emma’s hunches, said nothing.

“None of Zelena’s people are going after the warrant,” Emma went on. “Not seriously, anyway. So either she’s got some reason to stay out of it, or he’s already on her radar and she’s playing it cool.”

Killian’s gut clenched. Zelena was not someone he wanted to tangle with. He really, really hoped Emma was not about to suggest they try to infiltrate her organisation. “Where does that leave us?”

“We know he changed his name,” Emma said. “New ID, and they even hacked his military record and altered his face.”

Killian nodded. He’d been impressed. The differences were subtle, but enough that if Liam grew a beard and changed his actual appearance a little, he’d probably go unrecognised. It must’ve cost a small fortune—and, given that half the galaxy was currently looking for him, it had been worth it.

_What have you gotten yourself into, brother?_

“I want to go to Enverley,” Emma said, breaking into his thoughts.

Killian cringed. “Booth?”

“He’s expensive, but he’s good,” Emma said. Killian felt his jaw clench. He’d never liked the man. Booth’s mystery-wrapped-in-an-enigma routine grated on his nerves, and the dislike seemed to be mutual. Generally, they avoided each other.

“You think he’d give us Liam’s new identity?” Killian asked, wondering as he said if it really could be that easy. He’d deferred to Emma, and she’d made no attempts in that direction... surely there was a reason for that.

Emma shook her head. “Not a chance. He doesn’t keep records. Wouldn’t be a very good ID doc if you could just hack his lists, or torture it out of him.”

“So why go to him?”

“Not him,” Emma said. “But if Liam went to see him, it’s a place to start. And August has a lot of contacts. Like, say, someone who specialises in organising transport for people who don’t want to pass through any rigid security checks, or don’t have a lot of money.”

Killian nodded. “I take it you have someone in mind.”

“Yeah.” The furrow in Emma’s brow deepened just a little, and she drew a deep breath before she spoke next. “Cassidy.”

That explained the look on her face. Killian stared back at her. “Bloody hell.”

“Yeah.” Emma shrugged, as if it didn’t matter, though she had to know that she wasn’t fooling him. “Like I said, I hate it.”

He hesitated. He’d known Neal Cassidy for years, though they hadn’t spoken much more than a few hostile words in over ten years, not since Neal had tried to steal the _Jolly Roger_.

Emma’s history with Neal was, if anything, worse than Killian’s She’d been seventeen when Neal had persuaded her to fence some stolen goods for him and let her take the fall when the feds showed up. She’d done a year in the Vaures-7 penal colony.

With all of that, Killian was not at all eager to come face to face with Neal Cassidy. “Perhaps there’s another option, love.”

“Not one I can think of.” Emma blew out a sigh. “Go on. Plot the course. We’ll have a few hours to come up with something better, but I want to get moving.”

“As you wish.” He busied himself with the controls, keying for co-ordinates from the nav computer and bringing the hyperdrive online.

“Make you a deal,” Emma said after a moment. “If he sells one of us to the feds, we break each other out.”

He would never have thought that he’d be happy to hear her joke about being arrested. “Done.”

They shook on it, and Killian glanced down at Emma’s boot. “Just be sure to bring that lock-slicer.”

She nodded, then narrowed her eyes. “You know about that?”

“Of course I know about that. I saw it on Nostos, just before you made off with that damnable nav module.”

She looked briefly guilty at the memory, then frowned again. “That was before you handed me over to the cops. Why didn’t you tell them?”

He shrugged innocently, grinning. “It’s their job to check for things like that, not mine.”

The furrow on her brow was completely gone now, replaced by a glint in her eyes as she smiled back. “Uh-huh.”

The nav computer chimed, and Killian turned back to the display. “Right, then. It seems we’re going to Wanker Central. Buckle in.”


End file.
